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| 1955 |
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| Widespread persecution of Baha'is. | 1 |
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| 1956 |
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| Piped water available to Tehran for the first time. | 2 |
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| 1957 |
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| Creation of SAVAK, the shah's secret police. The organization functioned above the law, arresting suspects as it saw fit and often in secret. Torture, execution, and assassination were other methods that SAVAK did not hesitate to use. | 3 |
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| 1958 |
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| Beginning of television broadcasts, on a privately owned station. Television was later nationalized in 1969. | 4 |
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| 1960–89 |
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| Growth of the population from 23 million to 50 million. The proportion of urban dwellers rose from one-third to about three-quarters of the total population. Tehran's population tripled from 2 million to 6 million (1986). | 5 |
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| 1960–79 |
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| Improvement in general literacy, from around 20 percent of the population up to 40 percent. | 6 |
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| 1960–63 |
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| THE WHITE REVOLUTION, a program of sweeping social and economic reforms, became the central doctrine of the shah's regime. The goal of the White Revolution was to transform Iran into a modern society and a great Asian power. | 7 |
| In the forefront of the White Revolution was LAND REFORM, which was certainly the shah's most publicized measure. Like other land reforms in the Middle East, the chief effect of the shah's program was to smash the power of the great landowners, who had previously owned about half the cultivated land and dominated the countryside. Landlords were restricted to ownership of one village. They were awarded compensation for sequestered land, which was then distributed to peasants. Small absentee landlords retained about half the arable land and continued to thrive, but their survival did not prevent the emergence by the early 1970s of nearly 2 million small-scale independent cultivators. The performance of the new rural order fell far below expectations. Agricultural production steadily sank during the 1970s despite the widespread availability of fertilizers and tractors. | 8 |
| Other reforms included the nationalization of forests and pastures (1963), the literacy corps (1963), the health corps (1964), and the reconstruction and development corps (1964). The religious corps (1971), in spite of its name, was founded to promote the ideals of modern secular culture and was staffed by graduates of secular universities. | 9 |
| The main opponents of the White Revolution were the religious establishment, wealthy landowners, and tribal leaders. The first and second groups were stripped of substantial property and wealth. The religious establishment was also apprehensive about cultural and religious reforms. All three groups resented the rise of the state and their consequent loss of power and prestige. | 10 |
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| 1960 |
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| Death of Nima Yushij (b. 1897), generally considered Iran's first modernist poet. | 11 |
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| 1962 |
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| Women received the right to vote. | 12 |
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| 1963, June |
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| Popular opposition to the shah. A disparate coalition of shopkeepers, religious officials, students, and unemployed workers staged violent demonstrations against the policies of the shah's regime, particularly the programs of the White Revolution. Led by the Ayatollah Khomeini, the opposition demanded the reform of the government, but had not yet reached the point of calling for a revolution. Rioting soon spread to all of Iran's major cities. The authorities put down the protests with great severity. It is estimated that over 1,000 people may have died in clashes with police. | 13 |
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| 1969 |
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| Death of JALAL AL-E AHMAD (b. 1923), literary author and social commentator. He was especially known for his criticism of blind and excessive westernization. | 14 |
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| 1971 |
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| Founding of the Sazman-i Mujahidin-i al-Khalq, a guerrilla organization that staged attacks against the shah's regime. Its ideology was an eclectic mixture of Islam and left-wing doctrines. | 15 |
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